When a mother makes her children drink a bottle of toilet bowl cleaner and then drinks the same poison herself afterwards, is it the mother’s fault, society, or government’s?
Is she to blame for not finding another way to put food on the table when her construction-worker husband cannot send home money, or is it the fault of society that is apathetic to the plight of people who are suffering? Or can this sin be placed solely on the shoulders of the government, for the failure of its cash subsidies and other fixits to bring hope to the poor?
I remember hurting this way when Mariannet, a young girl, hanged herself last November 2, 2007 because she was desperate about life itself.
I am not a stranger to poverty. I know how it feels to see a single parent worry about where to get money for the next day. There is no security; no hope. What if your toddler’s hunger brings you to the tipping point?
I don’t have the answers. I’m also not fond of pointing fingers. I just know that something has to be done. And just as I know that we can’t all save the world from cavities, maybe one good deed for others and one intelligent personal finance deed for one’s self tomorrow (we can’t help others if we are not standing on higher plane), could make a difference, if done by 1,000 people all at the same time.
26 Responses to “Tipping point of poverty”
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Pages: [6] 5 4 3 2 1 » Show All
December 14th, 2008 at 9:19 am
I know the feeling of poverty and hopelessness, having just recovered from my family’s financial ruin 10 years ago. We lost everything during the 97′ Asian financial crisis when banks raised their loan interest rates to levels never seen before.
We lost our mortgaged house, our two cars and our construction business collapsed. My mother even contemplated of committing suicide. Those were the darkest days of our lives and just when I was starting to go to collage back then. But with determination and luck, me and my parents managed to bounce back. We should never loose hope, pray to God but most importantly work hard.
September 15th, 2008 at 5:32 pm
@ salve, yup yup!
September 11th, 2008 at 7:39 pm
Chris, ooopps! Correcting entry here! Hahaha! Minor minor lang naman:
PHILADELPHIA, July 29, 2008 - PRNewswire-USNewswire via COMTEX/ –
A newly released evaluation by Standard and Poor’s rates the [Company Name Deleted] on the same credit worthiness level as such companies as Procter & Gamble, Merck & Co. and United Parcel Service.
S&P says [Company Name Deleted] is strong and stable, an endorsement of [Company Name Deleted]’s ability to carry out its mission of developing and managing quality, public housing during a time of continuing cuts in federal funding.
S&P cited several factors as contributing to [Company Name Deleted]’s investment grade (AA-) rating.
I originally said AA+ kasi. My bad.
September 11th, 2008 at 6:31 pm
This is my 2nd and last installment of my response to Chris of 10.
So were we involved in the subprime mess?
I mentioned housing tax credits. Every year, there’s a housing tax credit budget. IRS awards these to state housing agencies. State housing agencies in turn awards these to developers competitively. We are one of those real estate developers who submit proposals and if we win, we get the tax credits, sell it to investors and partner in a development as an investment. That tax credit can be used to reduce your federal tax liability. However, we are not your typical real estate developer, we are more focused in bringing affordable low income housing units to the city. That’s our goal.
Our development is only for low income people (we use HUD defined average median income), in other words, if you are earning a certain bracket a year, you can’t buy or rent our property. Our properties are rental and homeownership. There could no subprime on rentals only on homeownership.
So, could we be involved in the sub-prime mess? Nevah.
If you’re the 4th largest housing agency in the United Stated bounded by FAR (Federal Acquisition Regulations), HUD audits, PHFA (housing finance agency audits), and a host of compliance audits, believe you me – that was by far the toughest job I had, and the waiting list to buy a unit in our developments stretches to over two years. Why? The rental units are subsidized by the government. The units for sale are at a very, very low price, sometimes half the current market price and follow a very stringent procedure and we are required by the state and the federal agencies to follow a lot of compliance procedures.
It’s the same process. The mortgage that we close (for those units we sold) goes to our investor partners who packages them and sells them to investors. I happen to be the person who managed all of these developments, partnerships and corporations. The best part of investing with us? You have the full backing of the United States of America. Can’t get that in some of the investments that you buy in Wall Street. Hehehe! Now, the last Standard and Poor’s I received in June 2008 for our developments? We we’re rated AA+.
You better help me find a job in Manila, Chris. Hehehe!
September 11th, 2008 at 6:12 pm
Chris on number 10, I will answer you in 2 comments. Here’s the 1st part. I’ll post this in my blog kasi my readers were asking me kung gwapo daw tong si subprime:
Subprime mess started because of some fly-by night mortgage companies and invidivuals who wanted to profit on the housing boom. Subprime is a little difficult to be understood by average Filipinos considering that we don’t have mortgage companies here. What we have are post-dated checks dib a? Hahaha! Pag buy ka nang condo, give ka 60 pieces of post-dated checks. Here no.
When you buy a house, sometimes there’s a “3-points or 2-points” that you pay which is a percentage of the selling price. Those are actually commissions. That’s how these people make money. So, the more they bring in people to come on board and be a homeowner, the more money they make. They don’t check credit ratings no more and look deeper as to whether or not they can pay or have the ability to pay. One of the biggest tricks they did was the ARM (adjustable rate mortgage).
There were a lot of ARMs here even in my old neighborhood. 3 years, at some very low rate and they are really affordable, and when the true interest rate kicked in? Oh, and they forgot to tell you that the tax abatement expires in 3 years (sometimes) too! Now, if you’re the homeowner, you’ve just seen your monthly mortgage payment shoot up like a missile.
Now, these mortgages by homeowners typically goes to the bank.
All these mortgages at the bank are being sold to Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and/or Ginnie Mac or straight to investment houses.
The next thing they do is package these mortgages, bundle them into say $1million each, call them a beautiful brand name, then sell them to investors who have no more idea that those were actually home mortgages because now, they’re called “Funds”.
But the reality is that, at very bottom of these “Funds”, the homeowner can no longer pay. There are more shit that they (mortgage companies) but that’s basically your subprime.
(to be continued)